Whilst we would all like to produce perfect charts straight from AutoChart, the fact is, there will always be some degree of final editing involved. So, anything that saves a bit of time whilst actually using AutoCAD to draw or edit entities has got to be a good thing.
It's amazing just how many little hidden drawing and editing aids there are that can help you save time. Some of these may be obvious, but until you've seen someone use them (and asked "How did you do that?") you may never know just what you're missing out on. So, with this in mind, today's post is dedicated to a few drawing and editing tips and tricks you may or may not know about...
- Using object grips to edit an entity is fairly commonplace, but you can also quickly cycle between different operations by pressing the Enter or Space Key.This cycles the command from Stretch to Move to Rotate to Scale to Mirror and then back to Stretch. The command uses the selected Grip Point as the Base point, so the entity is Moved/Rotated/Scaled/Mirrored around this point.
- AutoCAD 2011 adds some nice mid-vertex grips that allow you to stretch two vertices at once. However, you can also select multiple Grip points to achieve the same functionality in earlier versions of AutoCAD. Just hold down the Shift Key whilst you click on the required Grip points. The stretch will then be applied to both points. Perfect for tweaking the size of your chart boxes!
- You can snap to the mid-point of two points by typing M2P (or MTP) before selecting the two base points. Alternatively, Right-Click and select Mid Between 2 Points in the Snap Overrides section of the Shortcut menu (you may need to adjust your Right-Click customisation settings in the Options menu to get the Short-cut menu to appear).
- Need to run the same command a number of times? Rather than having to recall the command each time, you can type 'multiple' at the command line and then type the name of the command you want to run. The command will then repeat until the ESC key is pressed. Note that this only really works for commands that can be run from the command line (i.e. that don't involve a Dialog box) so is best used for repeatedly drawing a number of entities.
- If you want to change the size of some text entities but need to keep its relative position (regardless of the Text Justification), then you can use the ScaleText command. This allows you to select the Text you want to re-size, specify the justification points and then enter the new text height. The text entities will be scaled around the selected justification point, so won't move in position.
You can see all of these tips in the video below:
If you've got any similar tips and tricks you'd like to share with other users then please let us know in the comments section of this post.
